I graduated college in 2012 with my Bachelors of Science in Applied Biological Sciences. It was the greatest accomplishment of my life. My mother, father, grandmother, aunts, cousins, and fiance were there to celebrate my achievement. It was never a question of whether I could do it, but rather when. When I started college, I was actually engaged to someone else and all of my grandparents were still alive. I remember how exciting it was, but also how unprepared I was mentally.

I took a nursing assistant course at a local community college a couple of weeks after graduating high school. I did well and started a full-time schedule for the fall. Halfway through that first semester I dropped out. Saturday morning biology classes and lab were not such a good idea. So I got married instead and focused on moving across the country to where my new wife was stationed. It would be a nice break and I could start-up school when I settled.

But I never got settled. Things went wrong one after the other. Before I could ever leave home, my brother (my mentor and best friend) was killed in a motorcycle accident on a Friday night two days before Christmas. I rode on the back of that bike the night before. He and I had already swapped and opened our presents, watches. My father still has the watch I gave my brother, I have lost the one he gave me along this journey. It would be one of many things lost along the way.

Moving for the first time is hard enough, but moving across country after such a tragedy is too much for anyone. Leaving behind my family and an unborn niece was difficult, but I moved anyway because I had a new beginning and wife waiting for me. School was in trimesters there and I signed up right away for a couple of classes. After the second week, the engine in my car broke down and needed to be replaced. We couldn’t afford it and I dropped out again. No school, no car, and no friends yet, so I turned to alcohol. I drank and I drank and before I knew it, two years had gone by, my niece was alive and well and I was back at home divorced.

Christmas day two years after my brother’s passing I would meet a girl at my grandparents residence. She was from out-of-state visiting her dad down the street. She was smart and encouraged me to go back to school. I enrolled again in community college and took two classes. I completed this semester of college. She would later move to my state and in two years I graduated from community college. She had just finished her first year at the university. She encouraged me to continue school, I encouraged her to drink.

My first semester at the university went horrible. I did not drop classes because I drank quite frequently and would forget to. In forgetting to do so, I failed two classes.  My GPA was 1.25 that first semester. I would transfer from my smaller campus to a bigger one to be closer to the one girl who still had faith in me. That faith was soon lost and she would later leave me because she graduated and I got kicked out of school with a GPA of 0.75.

It would take four years before I would enroll in school again. However, I changed one thing, I had quit drinking for a year already. The university would not take me until I completed and passed courses at a community college first. Two successful semesters I was able to transfer back to the very university that suspended me. I went full-time for two years including summers. Passed every class except one which I was able to retake. I graduated at the age of 37.

I jumped right into graduate school that spring and I passed both my classes. Shortly after, my fiance decided she was not ready for marriage. I tried summer school and felt myself struggling again. A misunderstood posting on social media and I was once again asked to leave the university. I maintained my sobriety through that ordeal and two years later I found a graduate program on the east coast. My grandmother had encouraged me to go and I have completed my first year, but it was a rocky one. My grandmother passed away this past January and I barely passed one of my classes,  but I stayed the course.

I am thankful I have continued to try, fail, and eventually succeed over the span of my life. I took a different route and I can tell this same story a dozen different ways. I could point my finger for all the reasons it didn’t work out the way it should have and blame anyone but myself from the beginning. However, I am where I am now for a reason. I have founded a new company called iamthankfullife and soon I will use that to help others who have gone down different roads themselves. Not just in education, but from all aspects and angles of life.

My journey and education continue this summer while studying abroad in Uganda. It will be a new experience and a way to continue learning in a different environment. I hope to document this adventure as well as to start iamthankllife to inspire others to continue going down a different road.

Thank you for reading and I will tell you more about my next journey as the time gets closer.